J.K. Rowling has announced that a play about Harry Potter is in the works: she’ll produce, along with Sonia Friedman and Colin Callender, with the goal of getting the play into development in the U.K. in 2014. Though Rowling won’t actually write the script, she’ll be involved in advising the writer. The world-famous writer said that this particular idea — which will tackle the years of Harry’s life before he discovers that he is a wizard — is the first theatrical Harry Potter proposal she saw that made sense to her.

Rowling has kept tight control over the Potterverse in the years since the boy wizard became a publishing phenomenon, but ever since the original seven-book saga concluded, the number of adaptations she’s created or permitted has steadily grown. There are the Fantastic Beasts and Where to Find Themmovies. There’s the theme park. There’s Pottermore.

The author’s stamp of approval has yet to go wrong, and there’s no evidence yet that the world will ever tire of Harry Potter. The continuing expansion of the story is another bit of evidence — in a year when only one of the top ten grossing movies of the year wasn’t part of a franchise or an adaptation — of an age of never-ending stories: once an idea is proven to appeal to a large audience, its last installment is rarely so simply as an ending. In other words, don’t be surprised if Hunger Games: The Musical opens on Broadway five years from now.